Allotment/Veg Patch Thread 9 - Spring is sprung, its getting really busy!

[bookbook]

Well, the last thread filled up quickly - maybe due to the horrid weather . Its time to battle slugs, snails and weeds !
Last Thread HERE

Hello needmoretea - this thread is definitely a small respite in amongst the busy bits of life. Have you had the plot a long time?

Morning
welcome NeedMoreTea - I think we need our calm and peaceful spaces even more now than ever...so don't despair. Being the nosey one - whereabouts are you, and have you had your plot long? I will ditto Gnomes words - just tidy a bit and then plant - loads of things can still be planted for a harvest this year.. Cover what you need to until you get around to it .
Its sunny here, so am about to be off and plant up leeks, and prep the last bit of bed for the savoy cabbages and succession beetroot and carrots.
elephant - that shed and waterbutt set up looks amazing :)

Welcome, needmoretea your meadow sounds very pretty

Cripes, it all seems to have run away with me, plot wise. I've popped put some tomatoes but they are way too close, so I need to move them or pant something else. I also possibly need a back up of something to put in if we get early blight again - last year I had to take out my blighted toms on the 1st July !

My corn doesn't seem to be doing much at all, but my broadies are thriving. My home ones were planted in November I think, and they're being picked now. My plot ones were planted this spring and will hopefully burst into flower any day now...

I finally attacked my chard and spinach! It was soooooo bolted, it was much taller than me, and I am quite tall. I picked 2 bin bags of leaves, which I need to process today, and I freed up a lot of space. The space MUST go to my french beans, which have been ready for planting out for weeks now, and which have totally outgrown their loo rolls. They're actually start to yellow where I rows me they've run out of nutrients in the soil. I am a bad bad grower. They will go in today, come rain hail or shine. I ran out of time yesterday, and also the soil was so dry that I could even poke a cane into it, so I gave it a good water and came home.

What - that's not a brassica - can I start off now?

I say no to brassica as I struggle to cover the brassicas and they end up crawling with caterpillars. Talking of which, I did find a few chard/spinach leaves with clusters of eggs beneath, including one that I've not seen before, which was a bright turquoise colour. Any ideas what that is?

Cath I've done cape gooseberries before (Damn you James Wong!)
I've had varying success. I think they need a long, hot season, as they take ages to germinate, and then to set fruit.

Mine this year didn't germinate, and it is certainly too late for me to try again.
If you do get any, they are delicious - so so sweet and quite bounteous. Apparently you can overwinter the plants? Once again I got mine to March, then they, promptly karked it.

book I envisage you having a big map on the wall with a pin for each of us on it

Thanks spotted that sounds good. I should have kept half to try and germinate on kitchen roll as I have more success that way with lots of things. Anyway we will see- delenfscehat sort of autumn we get I suppose. Pouring with rain here which has scuppers beach plans but at least watered in the seeds I planted yesterday.

Cath I share your James Wong obsession, getting a bit embarassing. I planted my cape gooseberries early April, they took a little bit of damage in the frosts but are small bushy plants which I am hoping will have time to fruit. Could you sow some in pots so you can bring them in if it gets cold before they're ready?

Yay for wheat ears Gnome, how are the rest of your ingredients coming along?

Welcome MoreTea.

Oh and IlPorcupino always good to come across another Pratchett fan!

And Bookbook you can put my pin in for south Hampshire.

Hmm. Not even sure what I was trying to say there..

Damm you James Wong. I am now the proud owner of a cucamelon. Grown with seeds donated by the man himself. Damm you Lackham garden show. at least I am not doing the catering this year

I wonder if there is a Venn diagram of Wong/ prachett fan base overlap . Good idea about inside pots for csoe gooseberries although now I'm worried I won't get any to germinate. Got my sister various herbs in the end. Dad is outside potting them up. I've just nipped out to the greenhouse and it's full of bumble bees and hover flies. I have to de- spider web it every day as the bee death count was upsettingly high. Just ordered more ladybird larvae. Ants farming aphids on my apple trees is an issue so I got some ant traps. Yesterday I tried putting the glue traps round the trunks without reading the instructions to wear disposable gloves. I finally found the swarfega under the sink a very sticky half hour later.

'damn you james w.' sounds like a great thread title for the next thread :o

pest you have seeds touched by the man himself!

The horticultural lecturer at work has mastered the art of mugging famous gardeners.

Afternoon!
Been back to the plot to net all the soft fruit with DH - big nets are an absolute nightmare, even when you think you have put them away tidy! Cue much muttering from DH......But the blackcurrants,gooseberries and loganberries that were all out in the open have been done. Took just a tweak longer than necessary in my mind :)
Ah, James Wong love - he was on GQT today. Cucamelon you say Pest been there , done that ( so has Spotted ) .
Cath I do hope you are doing a control on all this extra flavour stuff - how is the red pvc doing on the strawberries?
Spotted tricky but I am sowing maincrop peas, carrots and beetroot still for succession. I know netting is tricky, but how about a few autumn cabbages or cauliflowers?

We too have netted our blackcurrants. I walked down a path on the plot and a very fat pigeon waddled ahead of me. I think we had the same gait!

Some kind soul had left their surplus tomatoes at the field gate so I now have some tomatoes in my hot bed.

Attached are this week's photos. The photos are of the wheat, DH's mini vineyard and the scenic shot!

lovely Gnome - the wheat and the mini vineyard are looking good .
My main 2 blackcurrants are in the fruit cage, along with a redcurrant and white currant, but I inherited another humungous one, and have 2 gooseberries at the far end of my plot. The pigeons stripped the gooseberries last year, so we have netted everything this year. The loganberry is on a trellis by the side of the shed, so that was fun too.... I have to net the jostaberry here at home yet :)

Lovely photos gnome.

As I was leaving the plot this afternoon a plotmenter was digging lovely looking potatoes and his DP was cutting sweetpeas. My sweetpeas are only about 6'' tall but I may have a rootle around in my first row of first earlies in a couple of weeks time. I have done my mini hotbed for a few melon plants so fingers crossed, picked strawberries and did some weeding. Looking at that photo taken in March which I put up a couple of nights ago to show the strawberry bed I thought it was high time to take another. I think I can see some improvement .

Gnome I've just shown DP your photos, and explained your plan for a homegrown cake. He snatched the phone off me and said 'that's not an allotment, that's a bloody farm'

GInGeum if it is a farm it is writ very very small!

UnaOfStormhold sugarbeet is coming on well. At least it looks the part!

am I weird for wanting a couple of dry(ish) days?
I want to give my plants a feed of comfrey juice but the soil (especially in pots) is very wet.

Morning.
I'm embarrassed to say that my allotment marathon is in it's 6th year now. I was doing quite well but then it got out of control when I was pregnant in 2015. Last year I was in the midst of a house extension with a new baby (DD3), and this year I went back to work. I was a SAHM with the first 2, so it's been quite a shock to the system going back this time.
So out of 7 beds, I have managed to keep 3 going, but the others are fallow, and the bindweed is taking over.

I'll try post some pictures later.

We have rain! Beautiful, soaking rain. It has been so, so long. And now it's meant to rain pretty much all week.

So no garden for me for a few days. Glad I got a lot of weeding done on Saturday.

Gnome Your tiny farm is so beautiful.

Morning!
Just got back from the quickest dash to the plot. Dug over and manured a space for the free bush marrow I picked up. Am now very wet and muddy, but happy as thats one little job that is ticked off. And yy to rain here too Grouchy - this should get the sweetpeas, peas and beans going well.No more plot until Wednesday if its fine, then Friday, so hunkering down in the greenhouse will be the way to go for me.
Need - the fact that you have managed to keep 3 beds going through that is gobsmacking! Don't feel as if you are not doing well, you are :) - I am retired, and only started 7 years ago, when still working, but with grown up DC , and that was hard enough. Can you mulch or cover the fallow beds with cardboard or weed matting and plant some squashes through for ground cover?
Gnome - it is nearly smallholding though!